Mourinho may have claimed his sprint down the touchline to acclaim the scorer and whisper instructions in the ears of Andre Schurrle, John Terry and Fernando Torres, was purely about relaying the information.

He can say what he likes when he's just become the first man to steer eight teams into the semi-finals of the toughest competition club football has ever known.

Yet whether by accident (I don't believe so, and neither do you!) or design, this was an echo of that Old Trafford eveing when the hitherto unknown big mouth from Setubal announced himself onto the consciousness of the English footballing world.

Frenzied, manic, booting a water bottle out of the way as he hared to the corner flag, Mourinho did not repeat the knee-slide with which he greeted Costinha's receipt of Tim Howard's fumble.

At 51, the old knees aren't quite what they were. Even Mourinho has to accept the realities of the passage of time.

They point to his calculated viciousness. His desire to blame others and take the heat off himself. His smokescreens. His deliberate attempts to stoke controversy, to create an excuse.

At the same time, though, they ignore his remarkable, relentless, ability to conjure results, performances, victories from his players.

Chelsea's greatest triumph, of course, came under Roberto Di Matteo, not Mourinho.

But the values, drive, desire, determination that Chelsea demonstrated on that incredible night in Munich were all the qualities inculcated, infused, raised by Mourinho in his first spell in SW6.

Mourinho's DNA has become Chelsea's. An ability to overcome the odds, time and time again. To dig deeper than you believe possible. To rage, rage, and rage again, against the dying of the light.

And it was not just at Chelsea that the loyalty is remembered.

(Photo: Getty)

Ask the team of unlikely European champions he created at Porto, a side who have not been to the last four of the Champions League since and had not been before.

Listen to the testimonies, not just of Frank Lampard, John Terry and Didier Drogba, but Wesley Sneijder, Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Xabi Alonso and others.

And look at that record. Seven domestic crowns, across four countries, over 12 seasons. Champions League victories with different clubs – a feat only matched by the great Ernst Happel and Ottmar Hitzfeld – eight successful quarter-final ties in 10 seasons.

It would be easy to point to his record and dismiss it. He only goes to the money. He only goes to the big teams.

He does. But Porto had finished second, second and third in the three years before Mourinho began their decade of Portuguese dominance.

Chelsea had not won the title since 1955, were undermined by an inferiority complex that Roman Abramovich's money alone coukld not cure.

Yes, Inter did take advantage of Juventus' fall from grace and had won back to back crowns under Mancini. But the Italian only reached the last eight of the Champions League once. Inter have not gone beyond the quarter-finals since he left.

And while he was hounded out of Madrid by a sustained campaign orchestrated by Ramos and Casillas – witness the extracts of the infamous Diego Torres book carried by a national newspaper on Monday morning – he did go toe to toe with the greatest side on the planet, beating Barcelona to La Liga in 2012.

Mourinho is, of course, flawed, even if he wouldn't accept that description.

He is capable of acts of callous maliciousness, even on his own players. Just ask Torres. Poking Tito Vilanova in the eye was the nadir, even worse than the Wenger ''voyeur'' gibe for which he finally apologised in February.

But on the list of managers every player wants to play for at least once in their career, Mourinho's name would be at the top.

It may not be enough to win the Champions League or Premier League this season. But Chelsea have the best in the business. And this time, you have to imagine, even they wouldn't be so stupid as to let him go.